“Yes, Donald Trump really believes he is ‘the chosen one.'” So reads the headline of an article by CNN’s Chris Cillizza that trades on an offhand comment dropped by the president on Wednesday at one of his near-daily impromptu press gaggles on the White House lawn. (Reminder to self to do post at some point on how regularly available Trump makes himself to the media as opposed to his predecessors.)
In his column, Cillizza acknowledges that the president was “was, ostensibly, joking,” adding:
The point he was trying to make is that past presidents should have dealt with the inequities in the United States’ relationship with China but didn’t, leaving him to handle it.
But then, like any CNN loyalist, he proves he incapable of even-handedness:
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
But as always with Trump, his jokes are freighted with what he believes to be lots and lots of truth.
Here is the video of the president’s complete statement, followed by a transcript. Watch it and decide for yourself if he suffers from a messianic complex.
The fake news, of which many of you are members, is trying to convince the public to have a recession. “Let’s have a recession.” The United States is doing phenomenally well. But one thing we have to do is economically take on China. Because China has been ripping us off for many years. President Clinton, President Bush, and President Obama, and others should have done this long before me.
My life would be much easier, although I enjoy doing it, my life would be much easier if I said, “Let China continue to rip off the United States.” All right? Much easier, but I can’t do that.
We are winning against China. They’ve lost two and a half million jobs in a very short period of time. They want to make a deal. It has to be a deal good for the United States. They want to make a deal. Probably we will make a deal. But, if I didn’t do that, and somebody said it is Trump’s trade war.
This isn’t my trade war. This is a trade war that should have taken place a long time ago by a lot of other presidents. Over the last five or six years, China has made $500 billion. $500 billion. Ripped it out of the United States. And not only that, if you take a look, intellectual property theft, add that to it. And add a lot of other things to it.
Somebody had to do it, so I’m taking on China. I am the chosen one. I’m taking on China on trade, you know what? We’re winning. Because we’re the piggy bank, we’re the one that all these countries, including the European Union, wants to rob and take advantage of. European Union, $200 billion. China, more than $500 billion.
I was put here by people to do a great job, and that’s what I’m doing. And nobody is doing a job like I have done. Now, would China rather wait for a little more than a year and try to get sleepy Joe Biden to negotiate instead of President Trump? Maybe, but I don’t think so. They’re losing too many too fast. … They had the worst year they’ve had in half a century, and that’s because of me. I’m not proud of that. But they want to negotiate. And Sleepy Joe doesn’t have a clue. Sleepy Joe said China is wonderful. Well, China is wonderful for China. I’m wonderful for the USA. [Emphasis added]
Does he betray more than a soupçon of egotism here? You’d be lying to yourself if you said no.
But the part of the statement that the media are blowing out of proportion was totally benign.
Besides, if the mainstream media are looking for a president with a messianic complex, they might want to begin with the one they anointed more than once as a god. They might want to recall this cover that they created in January 2013.
Or this one from Nov. 21, 2010:
Not that the man himself was lacking in egotism. Anyone remember his declaration on the campaign trail that “we are the ones we’ve been waiting for”? You can watch it at 1:09 in this bravado-filled, self-congratulatory video.
You can read it in his flatulent acceptance speech for the Democratic nomination, in which he announced, “This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.”
No, the media are making a mountain out of this latest molehill because of their unbridled hatred for the man.
